Thanks for all the tips on the user interface. Helpful to know what others are doing, and that others are struggling with the same things.

I think I might map my trackball's buttons to the 1-2-3 combat moves. But I'm wondering, if my mouse has four buttons (left-click, right-click, small left button, and small right button), how do I map the three moves onto it? I wouldn't want to take up the left-click and right-click with combat moves, would I? If I don't, however, that only leaves two buttons for three combat moves.

I tried the combat rose, and that worked okay, but I found the arrows tricky to hit consistently because they are curved. For the moment, I've got it activated and am giving it some more time, but I'm not sure I'll use it for the long run.

I did notice those other two optional bars and have activated them. They are very helpful.

At a glance, I like that third-party interface. Not sure if I want to try it yet, but I like how everything is right in front of you.

Quote from: Blackjack on May 26, 2008, 12:48:03 PM

Late yesterday I just started taking my right hand off the mouse long enough to hit my 6-zero combo hotkeys, and that way my left hand doesn't stray too far from the 1-3 keys (I assign 4 and 5 to non-combo skills) and I started hitting combos and multi-key combos more accurately. Far from ideal though still. Dammit, we all need a third hand for this game basically.

That's the conclusion I came to as well: I need a third hand. I found myself taking my hand off the mouse for combat as well, but I kept thinking this would be a bad habit to get into if I wanted to learn how to fight in PvP. In my past experience, immobile equals dead, and you limit your ability to swivel with your hand off the mouse. So I've been trying to figure out different ways.

Anyone else crashing\freezing often? It's really getting bad for me now. I've tried everything, but I can't play for more than a few minutes without freezing up.Strange thing is this all started happening about 2 or 3 days ago. Up until then I was the one saying I didn't have one tech problem.

I dont know what to try anymore. I've tried new vid drivers...re-installed the game.....turned shader down to 2.

Anyone else crashing\freezing often? It's really getting bad for me now. I've tried everything, but I can't play for more than a few minutes without freezing up.Strange thing is this all started happening about 2 or 3 days ago. Up until then I was the one saying I didn't have one tech problem.

I dont know what to try anymore. I've tried new vid drivers...re-installed the game.....turned shader down to 2.

Any suggestions?

Am I the only one?

I'm having some issues as well, with freezing and low fps suddenly...although, due to my crappy ASUS laptop, I have to use nonofficial drivers from laptop2go, so, could be that for me. But, funnyli enough, this started happening a few days ago as well..

I used to pvp w/o hot keying most of my spells in WoW. I could take 2v1 easily. I honestly don't think it matters that much. What matters is how you handle yourself in the situation. No amount of hot keying is going to help if you dont know your class and the other guy's weaknesses. Though I knew my hot bars 100% and could do most of the stuff w/o looking down at them.

I just use the mouse to click on a combo and then the 1-3 keys to hit the directional attacks. Hasn't been too difficult for me so far.

That's actually very helpful to me. I've been trying to use the keyboard numbers 4 to 9 to cast combos and spells. I tried clicking on the combos instead tonight, and combined with another screenie here showing how someone had their bars organized, it made things go smoother. I still lose sight of my cursor at the beginning of battles and it can take a second for me to locate it, but otherwise I think I'll try working the system this way.

Gives me access to all the combos, all the combat moves and very good precision with my thumbs I used to play FPS' competively so I got used to the trackball for that (plus it's awesome for my carpal tunnel)

Teh n52te takes some getting used to and I hated it at first, hated it with a passion. But people have sworn by it so I stuck to it and now don't see how I could live without.

Gives me access to all the combos, all the combat moves and very good precision with my thumbs I used to play FPS' competively so I got used to the trackball for that (plus it's awesome for my carpal tunnel)

Teh n52te takes some getting used to and I hated it at first, hated it with a passion. But people have sworn by it so I stuck to it and now don't see how I could live without.

I tried an N52 a few years ago.... threw it away after a few months as I absolutely hated it and it made me less efficient. I am not in this to be competative, but to have fun so clicking works just fine for me.

Gives me access to all the combos, all the combat moves and very good precision with my thumbs I used to play FPS' competively so I got used to the trackball for that (plus it's awesome for my carpal tunnel)

Teh n52te takes some getting used to and I hated it at first, hated it with a passion. But people have sworn by it so I stuck to it and now don't see how I could live without.

I tried an N52 a few years ago.... threw it away after a few months as I absolutely hated it and it made me less efficient. I am not in this to be competative, but to have fun so clicking works just fine for me.

And I guess clicking works (almost) perfect fine in PvE. In PvP however, everyone is constantly running around and through you and you have to constantly adjust your facing/position with your mouse and right-click.

I just don't see how you can adjust your facing by moving your mouse with right button pressed and click on spells/combos with your left button at the same time. Of course, a good "clicker" will still beat a bad "button pusher", but IMO a "clicker" will always be at disadvantage and it will bring a lot of frustration.

And for no good reason btw, since there is a lot of buttons in "`"-"5" area (plus r, f, z, x, c, v), especially if you start utilizing Alt, Ctrl and Shift. All it takes is to set everything up to your liking, spend an hour fighting and getting used to it and you will see the light

I only click on spells/abilities that I use out of combat (Rest, Teleport, long duration buffs, etc.)

But in the end, of course, try everything and stick with what works for you. Being comforatble with controls and having fun is the most important. Just don't cry "PvP sucks in AoC" later on

I havn't had a chance to try this yet...but i have been languishing with a game that seems to run like utter crap while looking like a pile of dog shit as i keep lowering settings and getting no better performance and sometimes worse...

This is a total what the fuck moment for me....and i'm gonna hit the fan tonight if this actually improves things for me...as i've done nothing but continually adjust shit lower and get horrifyingly bad performance for the last week....

Knew something was wrong...but dayum... if anyone else here has been suffereing like me and not seen this before...try it... see if it helps. I've been in misery with a .5 - 16fsp game when i just spent 400 bucks on a new GFX card last fall.

I havn't had a chance to try this yet...but i have been languishing with a game that seems to run like utter crap while looking like a pile of dog shit as i keep lowering settings and getting no better performance and sometimes worse...

This is a total what the fuck moment for me....and i'm gonna hit the fan tonight if this actually improves things for me...as i've done nothing but continually adjust shit lower and get horrifyingly bad performance for the last week....

Knew something was wrong...but dayum... if anyone else here has been suffereing like me and not seen this before...try it... see if it helps. I've been in misery with a .5 - 16fsp game when i just spent 400 bucks on a new GFX card last fall.

Fuzz, or anyone else care to post the details. I for some reason still can't get my forum access to work on the AoC forums. According to my account page it says I have access but I can't ever log on.

I havn't had a chance to try this yet...but i have been languishing with a game that seems to run like utter crap while looking like a pile of dog shit as i keep lowering settings and getting no better performance and sometimes worse...

This is a total what the fuck moment for me....and i'm gonna hit the fan tonight if this actually improves things for me...as i've done nothing but continually adjust shit lower and get horrifyingly bad performance for the last week....

Knew something was wrong...but dayum... if anyone else here has been suffereing like me and not seen this before...try it... see if it helps. I've been in misery with a .5 - 16fsp game when i just spent 400 bucks on a new GFX card last fall.

as a rule of thumb developed during my days in EQ2 optimization hell, the first thing i do in an mmorpg developed anywhere within the last 5 years is to turn shadows down to at least medium. i was wondering why everyone was screaming about how awful this game ran while I was getting between 30 and 50 fps consistently while running it on high, and this fix may be the reason why.

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With all the trumpeting that developers always do about how realistic their shadows are, it always seems like the best way to get their games to run well once they're released is to turn shadows down or off. I'd love to see a game come out that has shadows optimized to the point where I can leave them turned up and have the game remain playable.

I guess the benefit is that a few years after release, you can turn on shadows on your new computer and the game will look awesome-ish.

fwiw, I get a reasonable but unspectacular frame rate (about 25-30 fps according to the in-game FPS indicator thingie on the lower left hotkey tray) with a so-so 8600GT card. I do skip the shadows (other than a Thief: The Dark Project game, I just don't find shadows add much of anything to any game I've played) and use only modest antialiasing (2-4AA). I think the game looks great. I really don't fixate on FPS numbers as much as FPS consistency and it's been pretty consistent for me (knock on wood).

I agree it's silly for shadows to still be such performance-knocker. If the GPU companies want to get hot and bothered about multiple processor cards, why not just create a separate chip that handles nothing but shadows?

Remember that EQ2 also uses like 10% of current video card 'power' due to their outdated engine being almost entirely CPU dependent. And they expected super fast single-core PCs in the future, so their engine doesn't support dual-core processors in the slightest.

Conan (at least on my gaming PC) takes wonderful advantage of current tech. Dual-core support, full support of the video cards on the market, etc. I can run with everything maxed out short of AA (never cared for it) and Bloom (same) with 30+ fps all the time (short of the random pauses the game has).

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for the love of god, someone tell us what the forum post said, i still can't log in, and i have horrible frame rates

Quote

Press ESC *or F10*.Go to Video Options.Click "High". I don't care if your computer sucks. Click it and shut up.Go to the Advanced Tab.Disable shadows completely.If you are on a laptop, scroll down to the system texture cache bar and maximize it.Click Apply, then OK.

There is a bug that causes low settings to actually produce worse FPS than high settings. With the shadows disabled, you can actually play better on high settings than low.

-_-

So in my own instance during a quest my FPS went from 30-80! The world i'm usually at 30-50 which on low I ran 25-30. Weird!!!

When your FPS drops, make sure it's not the shader bug where it reverts to 3.0 from 2.0.

I have never had so many problems just getting a game to run before, honestly.Now I'm stuck in a constant patching loop. It scans, starts to download a patch and then gives me the play button to hit. Which I do fully expecting the game to, well, PLAY....

Ya think?

Nope.......back to scanning and downloading the same patch............On round number 4 at the moment...

Question: if I go through the 20-ish pages of this thread will I find some detailed info on combat?

I have an 8th level barbarian and I mash the buttons for the most part. It wasn't until 6th level that I even hit a button other than the 3 main attack buttons. I figured out the opponents defense indicators quickly enough, but the rest is spraining my brain. When I hit a special attack, I see a brief popup to the side of my target that usually has a directional arrow but sometimes doesn't... is that where combos start?

Some of this was probably covered in the tutorial mission, but I had to jump out of the game due to a crying baby and when I logged back on all the tips that were lined up for my perusal were gone.

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It was this moment that took the movie from being a little ho-hum to “holy shit, did that shark just eat a plane!?”

Yes - when you hit a combo, you must then hit the "auto-attack" keys that the pop-up shows in order to pull off the combo.

Ex: You hit a combo that is UR (upper right) then up. So you click the combo, then you hit upper right attack key, then the up attack key. Combo finishes. There's a slight bit of timing involved, but you should get the hang of it pretty quickly.

The key is to pick combos in which the finishing move lands on an unshielded or lightly shielded part of your opponent. You can tell what the finishing direction is on each combo by the tiny slash in the upper right corner of the combo icon.

I have never had so many problems just getting a game to run before, honestly.Now I'm stuck in a constant patching loop. It scans, starts to download a patch and then gives me the play button to hit. Which I do fully expecting the game to, well, PLAY....

Ya think?

Nope.......back to scanning and downloading the same patch............On round number 4 at the moment...

Like the poster above said, there is a bit of timing involved, but not in the way you might think. For all the talk of combat being closer to a first-person shooter, it's really not. For combo attacks, especially those requiring more than one auto-attack, you need to wait to make sure the 1-2-3 (or q and e also for higher levels) directional attacks resolve in order before pressing the next button. If you press them too fast you ruin the combo altogether. Same for single combos. Make sure the combo finishes before pressing any other attacks or you may ruin the combo. Hopefully that makes sense. The main thing is to watch the pop-up to see the directional attacks finish before pressing the next one in the sequence.

1-37 is no problem. Things start to slow down a tad then, but I was able to get over the 37-40 hump pretty easily by doing grey/green quests. Then at 40 Fields of the Dead and Noble District in Tarantia open up, so I should be good.

So the first major hole seems to be at 50. However, I'm not there yet (just hit 42), so I can't state that authoritatively. It jibes with what I've heard though.

As far as content - I think some people say, "Lack of content" when they really mean "lack of *solo* content". We have a guild. There's no reason we can't get groups together and run instances and things in the slower spots. Right now I agree it's a little tough because we've had some members jump out way ahead of the pack, but over time we should start approaching enough critical mass of higher level members to be able to group consistently.

Every single MMO I've ever played, ever, does not have enough end-game content at launch. Every single one. The game's barely been out 2 weeks. Funcom's biggest fault, I think, is not a lack of end-game content, which is par for the course, but making the level rate way too fast.

A state of the game question. For you players who are entering into the higher levels is it true that it becomes a grind?Where are the "holes" in questing?(levels)

I am lvl 36 and at this point I see some problems with questing in AoC. It's not a lack of quests, mind you, it's the way they are presented in 3 different zones/regions.

My char is from Cimmeria, so I got to ~29 there and loved it. At that point I exausted all soloable quests there and went to other regions - Stygia and Aquilonia. Two main problems:

1. My quest log is full of Cimmeria quests plus gathering quests. Add some "run back and forth between threee regions" quests and I don't have much room left. The game forces you to switch between the regions, but does not allow to store all the leftover quests that build up.

2. I loved the story druing 1-20. I liked it a lot during 20-29 (both in Cimmeria on my main and Stygia on another character). However, when you start traveling between regions, there are tons of problems with continuity of the story. Majority of the "get you in the story" quests are now grey and are not displayed as "?" above the NPCs. As a result, you are receiving quests like "Go kill some mobs", but you are not really sure why you are supposed to do that, the story behind these actions is lost.

I heard this problem is kind of unique to the lvl 30-40 range, the game is losing some of its focus, but it picks up afterwards. We'll see.

Yeah, I hate how greyed out quests don't show up on the map or over the NPCs heads. I want to do them all, even if I'm 30 levels above them!

My general strategy when leveling in this game:

Start at the top of my quest journal. Do all the quests I can just going down the list, no matter how trivial. Kill every mob that crosses my path along the way to the quest location (assuming the mobs still give XP). When I get to the bottom of the list, I start back at the top. Usually I've leveled a couple of times, and quests that were too difficult before are now doable, or I have added new quests.

There is a bit of misunderstanding in a couple of threads on this forum, so I wanted to give you this minor update on what’s in there.

In addition to the updated loot that Athelan was talking about in another post the other day (http://forums.ageofconan.com/showthread.php?t=49917) , we have raid dungeons in our game with loot to match the effort. Kyllikki’s Crypt, Yakhmar’s Cave and The Dragon’s Lair are all awaiting visitors.After that, when you feel ready, the massive Black Ring Citadel bids you welcome.

If a smaller group is more your kind of thing, a group dungeon like Atzel’s Fortress might be the thing for you. There are many secrets to be found in the fortress’ corridors.

Currently there is a bug in the loot code, to be specific: 100% chance of a drop wasn’t always 100% certain.

It’s also worth mentioning that there are some problems with the view distances in dungeons. Fixes for both these issues are on its way out to you.

With this said, I hope you enjoy what the PvE end game in Age of Conan has to offer.__________________Eirik 'Drauge' M.Raid ScripterAge of Conan

Do you stop getting new combos after lvl 20 or something? both lvl 22 and 23 came and went last night for my dark templar and i received no new spells/combos. in perusing the 'net for class guides, they all seem to end their combo lists at lvl 20.

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